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Mendels Principles of Heredity

A set of generalizations based on Gregor Mendel's published scientific works that attempts to explain heredity and inheritance pattern. These generalizations include the Law of Segregation and the Law of Independent Assortment as his summaries from his empirical findings and statistical analysis through his botanical breeding experiments.

Supplement

Mendel conjectured that "unit factors" segregate and assort during gamete production, and are passed on from parents to offspring (i.e. via gamete formation, fertilization, and embryogenesis). These unit factors exist in two sets. These two sets are acquired by the offspring from its parents, one derived from each parent. These unit factors derived from each parent may contain different (genetic) information for the trait of the offspring. Furthermore, Mendel conjectured that for a particular trait (e.g. color, size, etc.) there would be two forms of unit factors, one of these two would be expressed in the phenotype of the offspring while the other would be masked.

Mendel published his findings in 18th century. However, his works were initially unaccepted by many. His works were rediscovered in 19th century. It eventually laid foundation to genetics.